Jimmy Kimmel’s much-discussed move to 11:35 p.m., putting him in head-to-head-to-head competition with big dogs Letterman and Leno, turned out to be something of a non-event.

Not even Kimmel brought his best game, and Leno considerably less than that. Letterman’s performance was blithely average.

Will three shows at 11:35 p.m. change the late-night dynamic? Not likely. Even with his brand irrevocably tarnished by the whole Jay Leno Show fiasco, Leno’s audience has adamantly held on, preserving his unwarranted time slot lead. Even Letterman’s rare baring of his soul, such as it is, to Oprah on the weekend, is not going to bump his second-place standing.

Kimmel may pick up a few viewers at the earlier hour, but not enough to substantially affect his competitors. His trash-talking of Leno in print in the days leading up to the move is not going to win him any converts.

In a significant sense, he’s already won that war anyway, or at least an ancillary skirmish, with a currency from after-air internet clips that Leno can’t touch and Letterman can barely maintain. His only real competition in this regard are The Daily Show and Colbert Report, airing before, and Jimmy Fallon, after.

Kimmel’s debut ratings saw him beat Leno and Letterman in households and in the 18-49 demographic, according to Deadline.com. Jimmy Kimmel Live earned a 1.0/5 rating, beating The Tonight Show (0.8/4) and Late Show (0.6/3) in 25 markets with local people meters. According to Nielsen, Kimmel’s move earned a 2.8/8 household result, compared with Letterman’s 2.7/7 and Leno’s 2.4/6.

If anyone blinked Tuesday night, it was Leno, who started his Tonight Show an entire minute early, as if that would pre-emptively protect his turf. And what did he do with those extra 60 seconds? They could barely contain his opening credits and customary audience handshaking, and maybe half of the first of a series of lame monologue jokes about college football.

Kimmel didn’t resort to Notre Dame-bashing until about 10 minutes in.

Ten minutes into his show, Letterman was throwing to his first commercial break with a vintage “up next” clip from 1993’s mercifully short-lived Chevy Chase talk show. Not sure what he was trying to say there, if anything. But any shot at Chase is always welcome.

Kimmel wasted no time in showing off his new set, with its panoramic backdrop and shiny new floors. He commended his network, ABC, for its “risky decision ... some would say a stupid decision.”

There was a shout-out to Nightline, now relegated to 12:30 a.m. to accommodate the Kimmel move, and an attempt to demonstrate that that show’s more serious content will be preserved at the earlier hour, as evidenced by a far-too-long clip from Honey Boo-Boo.

Kimmel relied on a couple of tried-and-true recurring bits to prop up what was unquestionably otherwise a substandard show. The first, particularly appropriate in this case, was the old “Lie Witness News,” a series of streeter interview excerpts where passersby are set up to barefaced lie about invented current events, in this case the new, earlier Kimmel show, which of course at that point had yet to even air.

“Did you see the one with the Dalai Lama? Wasn’t that great when he set him on fire? And what do you think of Jimmy wearing cargo shorts?”

Later on, there was the third go-round for the rather inspired “Celebrities Reading Mean Tweets About Themselves.”

It says something that these pretaped bits were the best thing about the repositioned show.

Kimmel did nothing to curb his later-night sensibility, with one particularly daring gag about the one-armed Bachelor contestant. There were also several deleted expletives over the course of the evening.

He didn’t do himself any favours with Jennifer Aniston as a first-time guest. To start, they brought her out with a sledgehammer, with which she proceeded to smash a clearly fake “new” desk, ostensibly under the mistaken impression that it was the old one. That fell flatter than ... well, the desk.

But not nearly as flat as their self-involved patter about the Mexican vacation they had just taken together with significant others Justin Theroux and Molly McNearny, and fellow celeb couple John Krasinski and Emily Blunt.

I direct anyone who is actually interested to the two-page photo spread in this week’s People magazine.

In the least successful bit of the evening, Kimmel invited Aniston to cut his hair on air. Apparently she used to do this as a kid. So what? How could anyone have ever thought that this would make for good TV?

Fortunately, Gwen Stefani and No Doubt were waiting on the outdoor concert stage to bring the hot mess rocking home with two songs.

Suffice it to say, the night did not represent Jimmy Kimmel at his best. It wasn’t even Jimmy Kimmel at Jay Leno’s best.

The only person who showed us their best Tuesday night was Honey Boo-Boo’s mom.

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